


Only Gays And Women Sleep

by TheMadWires



Series: I Tried But I'm Really Not Feeling It [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Abandoned Work - Unfinished and Discontinued, Abrupt Ending, Curtis did nothing wrong, First-name basis on a last-name character, Gen, I am incapable of finishing even the simplest of prompts, M/M, Post Series, Pre-Epilogue, Shiro runs obsessively in my fics, Shiro still has Kuron's teeth, get used to it, it's not really relevant but please don't forget that's not his body, let them be happy you savages, no beta reader we die like men, probable one-shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-12
Updated: 2019-08-12
Packaged: 2020-08-19 14:56:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,137
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20211637
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheMadWires/pseuds/TheMadWires
Summary: After the universe is saved and before they settle down, Shiro and Curtis have a little time to get used to each other that isn't either of those things. Short little scene of a slice of daily life on a non-wartime Atlas.





	Only Gays And Women Sleep

He ran laps around the Atlas as if its halls were the deck of an aircraft carrier. Around and around, every morning, or what the ship's schedule had passed for it. He never checked the time that Curtis could tell, but it was always for the same number of hours before standard PT, which he insisted be observed by everyone on board (a dictate from the captain that Commander Iverson made sure was enforced with a kind of sadistic glee unique to career drill sergeants and drill-sergeants-at-heart). Within a week of discovering the runs themselves, Curtis worked out that if he were to stand at certain corridors and intersections at certain times of morning, Takashi always passed them at the same time, and that, further, if he stood there with a bottle of water held out in offering, Takashi would snag it from him with a smile that made his heart melt into his knees and his knees melt into the floor, and that settled that as far as his own morning routine was concerned.

It had been about a month (give or take; time seemed to alternate between melting together and stretching out interminably in deep space) and four dates when Takashi took his wrist instead of the bottle.

“Hey,” he said. He paused to catch the bottle in his other hand—Curtis, startled by the change, had dropped it. “You're not on this duty shift, so... Did you want to run with me?”

“Me?” Curtis kicked himself. Of course him. There was no one else in the corridor. His eyes went to the ceiling. “Ah...no thank you, Captain, sir. I don't want to intrude on--”

“Ah.” Takashi cut him off. “No 'Captain', no 'sir'. We're off duty. And I don't mind the company.”

He looked back down. Takashi was looking at him with an unreadable but pleasant expression, unscrewing the cap of the water by holding it in strange, too-sharp teeth as he turned the bottle with one hand. He watched as the cap came off, then vanished, tucked into one cheek with Takashi's tongue as he took a swig of water. It occurred to him that Takashi was still holding onto his wrist well before he realized that Takashi was still waiting for a response. He cleared his throat. “...It's a little early for a run.”

Takashi's eyebrows went up. He twisted the cap back onto the bottle the same way he had twisted it off. “Hadn't thought of it that way.”

Curtis felt his face warm a little bit. Not enough to turn red, maybe. Usually he had his shit a little more together than this. About a month and four dates in and Takashi still had a way of making him scramble for it. “I was going to go back to bed after this,” he admitted.

Now Takashi looked surprised. “No kidding?”

“No kidding. I don't know how you do it.”

Takashi looked him over, still unreadable and still pleasant (always pleasant--he had a way of making you feel good-- but also, Curtis was beginning to notice, always unreadable) and then released his wrist. “Do what?”

“The--” He paused, then gestured vaguely. “Running all night and running the ship all day? Don't you sleep?”

“Ah.” Takashi flashed him another smile. Curtis' heart promptly migrated floorward. “Can't run away from my problems if I sleep.”

It was impossible to tell from his tone if he was joking. Obviously, he was joking. Curtis attempted a smile. It came out halfassed and questioning. “Right.” Takashi laughed.

“I can't sleep,” he admitted, tossing the water bottle to his other hand. He had begun to jog in place. “Haven't been able to since—” He shook his head, the smile spreading out a little, self-deprecating, endearing as hell. “Anyway, I feel like I've spent lifetimes sleeping already.”

“Not the way the rest of your team tells it.” Curtis frowned. To hear the rest of the team tell it, Takashi had had problems not being the first set of boots on the ground when alerts went up for the past few years. He reached out and put a hand on Takashi's shoulder, stilling him. “...Hold on. Are you seriously not sleeping?”

“I'm doing all right.”

“Takashi--”

The still jog shifted, taking him a step back and out from under Curtis' hand. “We can talk after my run.”

“Medical wouldn't approve of this kind of thing.”

“I'm all right,” he repeated. Another step back. “I get weekly checks anyway.”

“They check your--” Curtis faltered, fumbling for a word. “Your hardware. Not your state of rest.” Curtis could see that he was losing him: Takashi leaned his head back, looking down the intersection to be sure that it was clear. He moved forward, taking hold of Takashi's wrist again. “Come on. At this time of day it'd just be a nap before PT. A couple of hours. Humor me.”

“Going back to bed before PT would mean an extra shower.”

“You can make it a quick one. You've got a few hours. You have to take care of yourself, Takashi.”

Takashi frowned. “...All right,” he said at last. “All right. If it bothers you that much, I'll go back to my quarters and--”

For a moment, Curtis almost believed him. But the way his eyes only cursorily flicked back before wandering back down the halls—plotting his route—gave him away. He pulled Takashi in closer to keep him from bolting. The words came out before he thought of them. “Mine are closer.”

“Oh.” Takashi paused. His attention came back from the hallway and he raised an eyebrow, smiling faintly. “Is _that _what it takes for me to get invited in?”

His cheeks were _definitely _a little red now. He could feel it, and Takashi's small, warm laugh was as good as confirmation. “Hey. I'm genuinely worried about you--”

Takashi's wrist slipped out of his hold, replaced by his hand. He gave a light squeeze, then leaned over and kissed Curtis' cheek. “I'm giving you shit. Okay. I'll take a nap. You have room for both of us to crash?”

“Honestly? I don't know. I haven't exactly tested the room for capacity...”

“Sounds like you should have invited me in sooner.”

“Maybe I was trying to think of your reputation,” he shot back. Still, after just a moment's hesitation he tried to put an arm around Shiro's shoulders. They were huge; it wasn't easy. He thought twice about it when his fingers brushed the leading edge of the attenuated chunk of metal that had once been Takashi's far shoulder and the man flinched, but he was already committed; he compromised and dropped his hand, placing it part of the way down Takashi's back instead. “Did you ever think of that?”

“My reputation? No, I definitely never think about that.”

**Author's Note:**

> So... non-ending because this was supposed to be a prompt fill for a writing challenge, but it petered out on me. I'm posting it because I'm salty about all the hate in the Curtis tag. I'd like to think I'll feel inspired to continue this later because these boys deserve to be happy, but realistically this is probably as far as it goes.


End file.
